Rangers' 5-1 win over Pens pushes series to Game 6

Rangers' Ryan McDonagh (27) celebrates his goal in the second period of Game 5.

PITTSBURGH – The Rangers rallied, not just to keep their season going or to snap their long power-play drought, but around teammate Marty St. Louis, grieving the loss of his mother.

“We were all seeing it in his eyes,” defenseman Ryan McDonagh said. “He was trying to be himself but you could tell there was something off. But right from the start he was playing a great game and I think guys just fed off his emotion.”

So the Rangers, with two power-play goals and two tallies from Derick Brassard staved off elimination in Game 5 of the Metropolitan Division final with a convincing 5-1 win over the Penguins on Friday night at Consol Energy Center. The Rangers must do it again Sunday at 7 p.m. in Game 6 at Madison Square Garden.

The Rangers went 2-for-3 with the man advantage as Chris Kreider opened the scoring at 9:36 of the first period and McDonagh made it 4-1 at 8:48 of the second. Though they’re still just 5-for-47 in 12 postseason games, it snapped an 0-for-36 skid dating to Game 2 of their first-round series against the Flyers.

“It was a lot of weight on our shoulders dropped when Chris scored that goal,” said Brassard, who now has three goals against the Penguins.

“We just moved our feet, we played with emotion and we came away with a win.”

The Rangers were outshot, 35-15, in their 4-2 Game 4 loss at the Garden, which prompted a postgame team meeting.

St. Louis played a day after his mother, France, 63, passed away unexpectedly because of a heart attack.

The veteran player flew to his family’s suburban Montreal home late Thursday afternoon but returned to the team less than 24 hours later after he and his father, Normand, decided she would have wanted him to play.

“You don’t know how you’re going to feel; you don’t expect these things. It was a tough couple of days for my family,” said St. Louis, who planned to return to Montreal today before returning for Game 6. “I know deep down my mom would want me to play this game. She’d be proud of me coming here and trying to help as much as I can.

“She was a great lady, the best human being I’ve ever known in my life and I owed it to her to do it,” St. Louis added. “I think [my father] needed that too, for me to play. I know he’s proud and I know my mom’s proud right now.”

St. Louis didn’t figure in the scoring but was very active in the offensive zone.

“We just all feel so terrible,” Brian Boyle said. “We didn’t know if he was coming back and playing or what was going on. We are a team, a close team and the short time he’s been here he’s pretty magnetic and his love for the game and being at the rink, we all appreciate.

“It’s something that was impressive watching him tonight. He’s a special person.”

Boyle, along with McDonagh and Marc Staal, was part of the Rangers’ five-on-three penalty kill that held the Penguins without a shot for 1 minute, 23 seconds late in the second period.

The Penguins trailed, 4-1, at the time but could have regained momentum going into the third period.

Evgeni Malkin, with a great stickhandling effort, split Staal and Dan Girardi to halve the Rangers’ lead to 2-1 at 3:23 of the second period.

But Brassard, who had given the Rangers a 2-0 lead at 15:23 of the first period, shot through a maze of Penguins bodies to convert his own rebound. That allowed the Rangers to regain a two-goal lead at 7:58 of the second. McDonagh scored 50 seconds later.